Singapore legislation
Section 11
Section 11
Duty to keep accounting records
(1)
Unless otherwise excepted by regulations made under this Act, the governing board members of a charity must ensure that accounting records are kept in respect of the charity which are sufficient to show and explain all the charity’s transactions, and which —
disclose at any time, with reasonable accuracy, the financial position of the charity at that time; and
enable the governing board members to ensure that, where any financial statements are prepared by them under regulations made under section 12, those financial statements comply with the requirements of those regulations.
(2)
The accounting records must, in particular, contain —
entries showing from day to day all sums of money received and expended by the charity, and the matters in respect of which the receipt and expenditure takes place; and
a record of the assets and liabilities of the charity.
(3)
Subject to subsection (4), the governing board members of a charity must preserve any accounting records made for the purposes of this section in respect of the charity for at least 5 years after the end of the financial year of the charity in which they are made.
(4)
Where a charity ceases to exist before the end of the minimum period in subsection (3) for preserving of accounting records in respect of the charity —
the last governing board members of the charity; or
any one or more of the last governing board members of the charity, as may be agreed by the last governing board members,must preserve the accounting records to the end of that period, unless the Commissioner allows the accounting records to be earlier destroyed or otherwise disposed of.
(5)
Subsection (4) also applies to a charity that ceases to exist before 1 April 2018, if the minimum period in subsection (3) as it applies to any accounting record of the charity has not ended on that date.[12